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BlueshirtsBrotherhood Forums Rule Book

This is the BlueshirtsBrotherhood Forums Rule Book. We advise new members read the rules upon registering, as our rules differ from that of a lot of other Forums. Be advised that the Rule Book can be changed at any time, for any reason. Any major updates to the rules will be announced.

1. General Rules

A. Flaming/Harrassment: Flaming is defined here as an insult (or insults) toward another member with malicious words or threats and is prohibited at BlueshirtsBrotherhood Forums. While light jabs (which the severity of will be determined by the Staff) are likely to be let go, please do not take this as an invitation to set up shop here and repeatedly toe the line.

Members join here to discuss the New York Rangers and hockey in general, not to have to defend themselves from personal slights, no matter how much you may disagree with them and/or this rule. As a user your job should be to objectively discuss and debate the topics posted here, not the users who post them. No matter the atmosphere of a thread or how frustrated you are getting with a user, it is never OK to flame them as a result. If you have an issue with a particular user, please report the posts or utilize our Ignore Tool so as not to have to read posts from that user moving forward. You can ignore any standard user on the forum. You cannot ignore Stafff, however.

Additionally, harassment is defined here as repeatedly attacking another user which includes gang mentality posting (joining other users in bashing another). This behavior will undoubtedly leave you with an infraction or possibly banned if it continues, so we strongly suggest you do not do so. If you notice an issue, do not police it yourself or join in simply because others are doing so — simply report the post and let the Staff handle the matter(s).

Regarding both matters, for remarks of prejudice an auto-ban may be implemented in place of infractions if deemed severe enough.

B. Trolling: This is known as following a specific poster around, for the sole purpose of annoying them or insulting the topic they are commenting on. It can also apply to simply insulting a thread or post, rather than having an opinion on it. If you think a thread or post sucks, there is no need to comment on it. Move on, or make a contribution to the conversation in the topic. Trolling may result in an Infraction.

C. Do Not Haze New Members: New members should feel welcome to post their questions or comments, no matter how well-informed or mis-informed you may feel they are. Do not harass them for asking questions or treat them poorly for not knowing the proper etiquette to posting here. Remember, we were all new once before! If you feel they've broken a rule, simply report the post the same as you would any other member.

Welcome them to our boards and help them find the information they are looking for. Give them a chance to get used to things here. Hazing new members will not be tolerated. The purpose of the forum is to grow and give as many Rangers fans as wish to join the chance to become part of this community. If you feel compelled to help, then help guide them into becoming better users. Do not help to escort them off the forum as it is not your place to do so. Hazing new members may result in an Infraction. Repeat offenses may result in a permanent ban.

D. Closed, Deleted or Moved Topics: If one of your topics is closed, moved or deleted, do not post it again or post a thread complaining about it. If you are unsure as to why your topic has been closed, deleted or moved, feel free to PM one of the Forum Moderators from which the topic was removed, or one of the other Staff members and they will be happy to give you an answer. If you re-post your topic, you will be warned and it will be removed again — if you do it a third time, you will be infracted.

E. Duplicate Topics: Duplicate topics are unnecessary and add to the overall mess of the forum. Posting them here may result in an infraction if the offense is deemed to have been intentional and/or if you are a repeat offender. The best thing you can do before starting a thread is to search the forum are you starting the thread in before starting it. If a topic has not been posted in for more than a month then you may start the topic again. However, if it is under a month you must post in the existing topic. In the event of a major news breaking and more than one topic coming up within a few minutes of each other, all the topics will be merged and no infractions will be given. Being the author of a thread is irrelevant to discussion here, so if your only goal is to be a thread-starter, seek membership elsewhere.

F. Signatures: You are allowed one image in your signature and a few lines of text. You are not permitted any moving signatures or video signatures. If your signature violates these conditions, we will edit it for you and you may be subject to an infraction. Signature images can be no taller than 150 pixels and no wider than 500 pixels. This is not debatable. We encourage users to help themselves develop a personality here, and one of those ways is through a signature image, but the size limit is there for a reason. Signatures can be very distracting, and the larger the image is, the larger the size of it and the longer the load time. Signature violations will result in removal or a request to remove it, and will be subject to an infraction.

G. Advertising: We understand you have outside ventures and may wish to advertise here, and we're not entirely opposed to that idea (for now), but do so with discretion. Do not flood the forum with posts about your venture or spam our users in any way — the last thing I want to see here is you using the forum as a personal springboard to all your eBay listings or anything of the sort. Keep it simple and clean and we'll be OK.

If you run a blog or a related site, we have no issue with you posting to articles you've written or have hosted there, but you must provide snippets of your articles the same as you would any other article in addition to the link back to your site. Simply posting links to your site will get you in hot water pretty quickly.

H. Plagiarism & Copyrights: Obviously the majority of information we share here comes from others sources, especially editorial pieces, so please, when quoting from another source (and you must quote if the information is not inherently yours), only post a portion of the article content—no more than half the topic as a general rule of thumb—as well as a link to the original. Do not post the entire article, especially if it comes from a site that requires users to pay a subscription to read its content.

If you are posting content that isn't available online like a magazine article or book, you must cite the work the same as you would in any written work referencing it. You should include the author, date, title of the work and publisher.

You can also simply truncate this to something like The Hockey News (2011).

Either way you must cite the source.

I. Profanity & Vulgarity: Yes, you can curse here, but be reasonable, please. We're treating this forum like an adult forum, so profanity isn't going to be censored. There's no reason to quiet you from using everyday words you'd use in normal life, but that isn't an open invitation to be overly profane or vulgar. Use discretion. Understand that some people already find it distasteful and insulting — the last thing they need to see if you taking it twelve steps further simply because "you can". If we feel you're over-stepping your bounds, you'll be messaged privately about the matter. If you continue to over-step those bounds you'll be infracted and possibly banned, so please use common sense here.

J. Editing Preexisting User Content: Big words that simply mean that you shouldn't be editing content that's been submitted by other users to read as they never intended. This includes "fixing" a users post, even as a joke. While it's relatively harmless to do so in most cases, other users may not be "in" on the joke, so by altering the original text of another user, you may be indirectly changing the view of them for other users who weren't involved in the discussion or who may not have read every post the way you did.

For the most part, this won't be an infractable offense, rather just something we'll remove offending posts from, but repeat offenders will be subject to an infraction/warning.

K. Post Padding & Forum Flooding: While we by no means want to discourage user participation, users who "race" to achieve higher post counts for the sake of having a higher post count by posting brief and otherwise irrelevant replies to threads just to post them do not help the forum any. You actually hurt it, because you take otherwise useful tools like the "What's New?" button and flood it with replies only from you for users who are looking to see what discussions are actually being discussed actively.

While I understand that having a high post count carries a certain level of 'swag' here, posts counts must be earned, not awarded. It simply is not necessary for you to have a short-winded opinion on every thread. Not every thread needs your participation if it's only to post something like "Wow" or "Cool".

If it's determined you are post padding or flooding the forum with irrelevant and short posts and the staff feel your only reason for doing so it simply posting to post or to fast-track your count, you will be spoken to personally on the matter. If the issue persists, warnings/infractions would follow.

L. Posting Unsourced Material: Whether you heard it on the radio, read it on Twitter or anywhere else on the internet, when breaking news you must cite the source of the information. Sourced content is every bit the difference between a validated story, pure speculation and/or an outright lie, and we do not want to be known as a forum where false information spreads (or begins). Even in the event you don't have a link to the source, you still need to make note of where the information is coming from if it is not exclusive to you (as in your own work).

Posts that violate this rule will be removed. If we find ourselves deleting a lot of your posts, we reserve the right to further action which can include Warnings, Infractions and/or banning.

M. Spamming: Stupid, pointless and/or annoying messages. A number of the users on this forum go out of their way to do their homework on any given discussion and put honest effort into their posts when a debate is going on. Nothing is more antithetical and aggravating to that than a one-word post in response to someone's post or the OP that adds absolutely nothing to the discussion. We actually want to know why you feel the way you do about a certain subject to allow other posters to debate your opinion, so while we certainly do not require an essay for every post, we do ask that you actually contribute to the topic.

This is a looser fitting rule than some of the other forum rules, so Spamming posts would likely just be removed in most cases, and live discussions like Game Day Threads would be exempt from the Spamming rule, but if the Staff feel you are a repeat offender, you may receive warnings/infractions for it.

For the record, this wouldn't just be limited to just one-word replies. It would be applied to "stupid, pointless and/or annoying messages". The definition of that would be at Staff discretion.

N. Sexually Explicit Content: Due to more stringent enforcement by Google on what is considered "family friendly", BlueshirtsBrotherhood Forums is no longer allowing overly sexual images, videos or content. While nudity and pornography have always been prohibited, we are now asking that all members refrain from posting, either in threads or signatures, images, videos or content which can be considered sexual in nature. This includes—and I quote from Google—"images or video content containing lewd or provocative poses, or close-ups of breasts, butts, or crotches." Source

O. Gore/Death/Disgusting Content: This is something that will be left to the discretion of the Staff on a case-by-case basis, but images and/or video content of excessive violence, gore and/or death is not to be posted here. Whether it’s post-mortem imagery, videos of killings or anything in between — it isn’t to be posted here. As a general rule of thumb, if you can’t imagine the video or image would be printed on the front page of a newspaper or magazine, DO NOT POST IT. The posting of this content could result in an automatic and permanent ban, so be very careful when swimming in these waters.

2. Automatic Ban Offenses

A. Posting Pornography: Posting any kind of pornography—including simple nudity—on our Forums may result in you being banned automatically. Requesting pornography will also be considered a bannable offense. Think of it like this: if what you are posting is seen in a magazine, but that magazine is sealed in plastic, don't post it here.

B. Flooding: Deliberately flooding the Forums with spam, offensive images or anything else detrimental to the Forums, may result in an automatic Ban.

C. Hate Threads: Starting a hate thread against another user will result in a banning, the legitimacy of the hate thread will be at the Staff discretion.

D. Prejudiced Remarks: Racial, Sexual or any other kind of prejudiced remarks in ANY forum may result in an automatic ban.

E. Multiple Accounts: One account per user; no exceptions. If you've been banned, do not create another account; we will know it's you and you will be banned again — perhaps permanently.

F. Illegal Content - Anyone caught requesting or posting illegal content, such as live streams, may face a permanent ban.

3. Miscellaneous

A. Acting Like an Idiot: If the Staff feel you are not contributing to the forums and are simply a nuisance poster they have every right to infract or ban you. These are privately owned forums and it is our judgment as to who can and cannot post here, not yours.

B. You Cannot Start New Topics Until You Have Reached 10 Posts: This is to tackle the issue of bots and people not looking around and starting random new threads which add to the workload of the staff.

C. Stirring Up Drama: Don’t do it. If there is some aspect about the BlueshirtsBrotherhood Forums that you do not like, rationally make your case and discuss it in a mature fashion. Do not be immature and cause a massive fuss, as it will only work against you and may result in an infraction or you being permanently banned.

D. Ignoring Staff Warnings: This will not be tolerated, especially if you make it known publicly. Whether you agree with the warning or not, be smart about your objection and discuss the matter privately with the Staff member who issued it. This goes for both warnings, infractions and in-thread warnings issued publicly. Warnings are given out to prevent you from escalating things to the point that infractions would/should become necessary. Heed them. Be smart.

E. The Bar Room: It is a forum where almost anything goes. It is up to the staff’s discretion as to what is and is not acceptable. The general rule is “don’t cross the line”. Anything in the Automatic Ban section will not be allowed in there. Remember, the Bar Room is moderated at the Staff’s discretion, so before you post your comment, think to yourself whether any Staff member would have a problem with it. If you are unsure as to the answer to your own question, it probably is best not to post.

F. Questions and Suggestions: Before asking a question, please read the Feedback FAQ. Chances are your question has already been asked or answered. Any questions you have regarding the Forums must be asked in the Feedback Forum at the top of the Forums.

G. Ticket Sales and The Box Office: The Box Office section of the forum is designed to allow users an opportunity to sell tickets they may have to games, concerts or otherwise to other members of the forum. If your only purpose for being here is to sell your tickets to an event, and especially if you do not meet the 25 post minimum required to start new threads anywhere in the Box Office section, you may not use this forum as a platform to do so. This forum is a community, many of whom have been posting together for years, and as such, precedent is given to active members over new and/or inactive members. This is not to say that new members cannot sell tickets to events, but rather that they need to show they are willing to be active members of the forum before doing so. You may not, under any circumstances, post tickets you are selling for any event outside the Box Office forum. Warnings/infractions may result to anyone who violates this rule.

4. The Warning/Infraction System

Warnings are here to serve as a reminder to you that you are not following the rules, and every user is given a clean slate when they register for the BlueshirtsBrotherhood Forums. In the event you break a (minor) rule here, you will almost certainly be warned for your first, second and third offense. After the third offense, full infractions will be issued without warning.

In total, a user gets 14 Infraction points before they are permanently banned. The first two Infractions are just points on your posting license. After that, punishments come with extra Infractions. On your Third Infraction you will be temporarily banned from the site for ONE day, on your Fourth Infraction you will be temporarily banned for THREE days, etc. Registering a new account during any of these temporary banned periods will result in you being permanently banned from the Forums. Once you have been given a 14th infraction, you are gone for good. You will be PERMANENTLY BANNED! No one will be allowed back onto the Forums after a permanent ban. If you are caught, you will be banned again, and an IP Ban will be handed out with every permanent ban.

If you continue to pester the BlueshirtsBrotherhood Forums and re-register, you will be in breach of your ISP’s (Internet Service Provider) Terms of Service for abuse of the Internet, at which time you will be reported to them for your actions. If you wish to know why you have been given an infraction (although each warning comes with a PM to explain it), DO NOT start a thread in the Feedback Forum. Send a Private Message to the Moderator or Admin that gave you the infraction, and they will explain. Starting hate threads or complaining on the Forums about infractions, may only result in more infractions.

Every warning or infraction will be issued with a default forum answer as to what rule you broke, but may or may not also include a reason why, so if you are unsure of the reason you received a warning or an infraction, as is customary here, or you wish to appeal the validity of why you received either, you are more than welcome to issue a private message to the Moderator or Administrator who warned/infracted you politely asking why. You will be issued a response, though it's not a guarantee that it will also be accompanied by a retracting of the warning or infraction. If your reply is angry and filled with choice words for the infracting officer of this forum, you will not receive a reply, and you will receive another warning or infraction as that Moderator or Administrator deems fit.

Infractions are active for three (3) months before they expire, though their record are you to receive them is permanent so the staff can keep track of repeat offenders.